Family reunited with dog that went missing 18 months ago during Hurricane Sandy

Mike Krumboltz

The SideshowMay 2, 2014

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Not even a natural disaster could keep them apart: 18 months after Hurricane Sandy struck the eastern United States, a family was reunited with the dog they thought was lost to the storm.

How they found their pet is as amazing as the dog itself. About a week ago, the family went to Monmouth County SPCA in Eatontown, N.J., to explore the possibility of adopting another dog. They met with the adoption counselor and explained what kind of dog they wanted.

Canine candidate number one was brought out, and — Holy Chew Toy! — it was the same dog the family lost a year and a half back. The reunion was captured in the above picture. Note that Reckless the pooch appears to be smiling, or maybe just has healthy jowls.

Reckless wound up in the shelter last October as a stray, Liz Wise of Monmouth County's SPCA told Yahoo News. "We don't know this for a fact, but we believe what happened is that when the dog was originally lost after the hurricane, somebody found him and took him in and didn't bring him into a shelter. Then he got out again and one of our employees found him and brought him in."

Due to the organization's privacy policy, she couldn't reveal much about the adopters, but she was able to talk about Reckless' incredible journey.

Not surprisingly, the family was "extremely happy" to be reunited with Reckless, Wise said. "It's a wonderful, amazing story, and we're so glad that they've been reunited with their pet." The family called a couple of different shelters looking for their dog after the hurricane struck in October 2012, Wise said.

The story was published on the Monmouth County SPCA's Facebook page and has been shared tens of thousands of times, proving there's no story so great as one about loyal dogs and the families who love them.